


your home isn't a home (not anymore)

by brckendreams



Category: The Wilds (TV 2020)
Genre: Anger, Character Death, Dark Thoughts, Mentions of Character Death, Other, Profanity, Sad, rachel remembering nora
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-07
Updated: 2021-02-07
Packaged: 2021-03-12 08:20:13
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,024
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29257335
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/brckendreams/pseuds/brckendreams
Summary: After Nora's death, after the interrogations, after Rachel's parents finally rescue her from the hell she was living in for months, she has to go home. Rachel has to go home to a home that isn't a home anymore, not without her other half next to her. Rachel's home now being another hell of hers she has to deal with, alone this time.
Relationships: Nora Reid & Rachel Reid
Comments: 2
Kudos: 12





	your home isn't a home (not anymore)

**Author's Note:**

> trigger warning: character death, profanity, sadness
> 
> hey y'all, i've had this thought in my head for awhile so i thought i might write it! hope you guys enjoy it. Any feedback would be helpful :)  
> \- k

Nora was gone. 

Her other half was gone. 

That's what Rachel was thinking the entire car ride back home. That's what swallowed her thoughts whole. 

She hadn't cried yet, she hadn't shed one single tear for her sister and that scared her parents because that's all they did since they received the news. They were coping in their own way and Rachel was coping in hers. It's like what she said, the twins had their own little world that no one could ever understand and now that world the twins felt safe in fell apart. Now, only one hand tried to hold the world in place, but it was only one single hand. So, it couldn't hold that world together and so the world just fell apart, turning to dust as it fell. 

With that world gone, nothing felt real to Rachel. Not Nora's death, not getting off that island, and especially not losing her hand. None of it felt real, so why should she cry over something that didn't feel real? Maybe it was just her and maybe it was the loss of everything important to her that made her feel so numb to it all. Rachel wasn't ready to let it all be real, to have her world truly fall into nothingness. And it didn't get better when the car stopped and her dad turned off the engine, indicating they were finally home. 

Home. What a strange word to roll off her tongue to describe something that wasn't the island. Her home didn't feel like a home anymore, not after everything she went through. Her father and mother had stepped out of the car, her dad immediately opening her door to help her out. Rachel thought about fighting her dad, pushing him away, but what was that going to solve? She needed all the help she could get being one handed and all. So, she let her father help her out of the car and towards the front door of the house. Her feet dragging against the concrete path that paved a way towards the front door, her energy decreasing more and more the closer she got.

Rachel finally stopped in her path as she now stood right in front of the door. She watched as her father opened the door, the girl breathing in the old scents of vanilla, and just the old feeling of home. Their home. It felt so unfamiliar to Rachel now, the last couple months making her feel familiar to the smell of the salt of the ocean or the burning of a fire, or even just the fresh smell of nature that surrounded her and the other girls.

She missed that feeling of familiarity now.

It was so foreign to her to smell that vanilla of the candles her mother used to light every day to make the atmosphere inside their home feel more relaxing. Rachel didn't feel relaxed though as she still stood outside the doorframe that separated her from her past in front of her. All she wanted was that smell of salt infiltrating her nose every day back. Because that smell meant that she could go back. She could go back to the island with the people who she loved and missed so much now. When she didn't lose her hand or her sister or just all the moments, good or bad, that happened on that island. 

Rachel's dad looked down at his daughter, hesitating to ask the dreaded question, but it had to be asked. "You sure you want to go inside, sweetie?" he asked as he studied his now only daughter while she just stared inside the empty home. 

Rachel finally pried her eyes away from what felt like a newfound darkness from her past and towards her father, "yeah." That's all she could say before she took that first step into the house. 

Once she was fully inside those four walls, she finally exhaled that breath of anxiety she held in, feeling that she wasn't drowning anymore. Not like she was when she last stepped foot in that house as she drowned in her failures and her struggles with her eating disorder. Her feet started to guide her away from her parents, zoning out their pleas of protest as she walked towards the stairs. 

Rachel climbed them one after the other, the stairs making it seem like a challenge as she climbed those obstacles to get to her goal. Rachel silently climbed those steps, knowing damn well where she was going, where her feet were guiding her. The swimmer wasn't going to her room, no, that was the last place she needed to be. No, she walked right over to that closed door connected to the room that was right across from hers. That room that held way more memories than her own room held.

She hadn't even stepped in yet, her eyes shifting towards what hung on the door, when her chest started to tighten the slightest bit. But, Rachel wasn't walking away, not this time. Rachel wasn't going to walk away from the memories that held the one person that had cared about her more than anyone else did. She lifted her hand towards the center of the wooden frame and let her fingers gingerly graze the plush letters that read out Nora's name. 

The plush, purple letters that covered part of the wooden door that sparkled with glitter. Rachel's lips quirked up remembering that even at the age of 16, Nora would never take down that "piece of art" she made at just the ripe age of 5. Even through Rachel's past protests where she argued that Nora was too old to have it still hanging up, the girl knew to never take it down without Nora's permission. No matter how annoying she had thought it was. But now as Rachel didn't need Nora's permission to take it down, Rachel didn't have the guts to ever want to tear that piece of art down.

She could never ruin the memories she had of her sister. They were all Rachel had now.

But, who knows. Maybe Rachel could print out a picture of it to keep with her where ever she goes or possibly take them down and frame them to hang on her own wall. She just wanted all the memories of her sister.

As Rachel let her hand fall back down to her side, she slowly grasped the handle of the doorknob and twisted it before finally opening that door of pain she never thought she would have to even open. But, she let it open, now her nose filling with the mix of lavender and vanilla. Once the scent hit the girl, that's when Rachel's throat started to close, trying to not let her emotions fully get the best of her. Not just yet. 

Rachel didn't need to drown herself again in her tears of emotion, those emotions now being of pain and guilt and sorrow. Not just yet. But, the girl continued to slowly and unsurely walk into Nora's room, thousands upon thousands of memories flooding her mind as her eyes scanned the quiet and abandoned room. The room that used to somehow fill Rachel with hope and reassurance was now filled with emptiness and detachment as it felt like she was walking upon the ruins of happiness. 

The girl walked further into the room though against her mind's wishes, immediately going to one of the walls of photos that littered only a portion of her room. Rachel's eyes just scanned over all the pictures of her, Nora, and her mom and dad. A family. Now, that family was broken because the soul of it had left without a choice in the matter. 

Rachel picked up one photo in particular though and that was one of hundreds of photos of Rachel and Nora. That photo was taken after Rachel's first big competition win, when Rachel felt the most certain in herself and in knowing that people really did notice her. Rachel smiled as she remembered that day all too well and how happy Nora was when she won. Nora was holding onto Rachel as the twins instantly had beaming grins on their faces as they looked into the camera of her mom's phone. 

As Rachel's mind allowed that memory to surface and open fresh wounds into the girl, that's when Rachel let one tear slip past her barrier and down her cheek. But, as she turned the photo over, the words on the back had caused an entire flood burst through the dam Rachel had built up to keep them back. Those words her eyes scanned over again and gain were "always and forever my other half! I'm so proud of you, Rachel!" 

That's when Rachel finally was able to fully let her emotions get the best of her. When she allowed that flood to truly break the dam she built. Rachel first felt anger get the best of her though as she threw the photo at the wall, smashing the entire frame and breaking the other objects that it had collided with. She screamed, finally releasing those emotions of anger, hurt, and pain.

Rachel was finally accepting the reality around her that Nora, her twin, her other half, was really gone. And she was never coming back.

She was now feeling everything at once and she hated it. She hated that she could feel that loss and that emptiness that was inside her that she tried to fill and cover up ever since Nora died. Rachel didn't want to feel it, so her eyes frantically searched the room for something to help her release those emotions. And that's when she saw the umbrella Nora held close to her heart. Rachel took that umbrella she had gotten Nora as a present and repeatedly swung it at anything in the room. 

She swung and swung, breaking anything, releasing that pain she built up inside her. Everything that broke and everything that fell felt like Rachel right now. The world was swinging something at her, destroying the girl again and again every time it connected. The world just kept breaking her, making her feel pain until she couldn't anymore. Until she felt numb. Until she just fell, like the world she and Nora built and that had wrapped her in its arms. 

But, that world that protected her and healed her was now gone and all Rachel could do was let out that rage that coursed through her body until it just left her empty and numb. And after a while, after it let Rachel stand in the now destruction that she caused in Nora's room, she felt that hollowness. Rachel stood alone trying to wipe away her tear stained cheeks and stop her lip from quivering from finally letting herself release all the pain she held inside her.

As Rachel caught her breath, she dropped that umbrella and walked over to lay on Nora's bed. The bed that she used to crawl into when she had nightmares, when she couldn't sleep, when all Nora and Rachel wanted to do was be next to each other. When all they needed was each other. And as Rachel laid down on that bed, it felt like she was feeling that same feeling when she used to just lie down on that bed and talk with Nora, or even just sit there in silence. 

She felt that same feeling of home and that same small feeling of that world she and Nora created. That feeling broke her glass heart into millions of pieces, the waterfall of tears pouring out again as she closed her eyes imagining her twin lying down next to her. That feeling of home broke her because she knew that that feeling was going to now going to slowly disappear from her memory as she had to now continue on her own journey of life without Nora by her side.

Rachel couldn't say anything at first, but she finally spoke those five words that rang through her ears since the accident. 

"Why did you leave me?"


End file.
